Slideshow from ESC: Inside the self-tuning Gibson 'Robot' Les Paul

MANHASSET, N..Y. -- The world's first self-tuning guitar—the Les Paul Robot Guitar--took center stage at a live "Teardown," yesterday, at the Embedded Systems Conference Silicon Valley. According to Henry Juszkiewicz, Gibson Guitars' CEO, in a story last January, the company chose to use a "non-invasive technology from our partner--Tronical--that you can completely remove. Musicians value the tradition of an instrument just the way it is, so if you unbolt our electronics you have a normal Les Paul guitar with no extra holes in it or anything."

EEs might think that building a self-tuning guitar is not an especially daunting task, but the architecture for achieving that goal without changing the construction and appearance of the guitar involved several interesting innovations unique to the Gibson Robot Guitar. Check out this Teardown for a close looks at how Gibson managed to hit all the right technological notes.